Tag: Democracy Now

For “Prime Minister Netanyahu and the hawks in Congress, mostly Republican, the primary goal is to undermine any potential negotiation that might settle whatever issue there is with Iran,” the renowned political commentator and linguist tells Amy Goodman on a recent episode of “Democracy Now!”

One of the many uncomfortable realities that we all are increasingly obliged to accept, at least on a practical level, is that the many gadgets that power our personal and professional lives can’t ever be fully shielded from prying eyes.

The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (not pictured) last week unveiled what he calls “the strongest open Internet protections ever proposed” by the agency. Tim Karr, one of the main organizers of the campaign leading to the FCC’s net neutrality vote, talks with “Democracy Now!”

Dead at age 90, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (at right) was praised by President Obama “as a force for stability and security in the Middle East and beyond.” But analysts accuse him of turning the Syrian uprising into a proxy war with Iran, and U.S. diplomatic cables identified the country as the world’s largest funder of militant Islamist groups.

Inflammatory remarks made by Patrick Lynch over the past many weeks of sometimes fatal tension between police officers and private citizens are grounds for dismissal from the force, retired NYPD Detective Graham Weatherspoon says.

When a grand jury declined to indict an NYPD officer in the death of Eric Garner, The Nation Institute fellow drove past the reservations, equivocations and micro-concerns that typify polite journalism and seized the message of the day.

After a second night of massive protests in New York City against a grand jury’s failure to indict NYPD officers in the death of Staten Island resident Eric Garner, “Democracy Now!” hosts an explosive roundtable discussion on police racism against black Americans.

Actors including Viggo Mortensen, Peter Sarsgaard and Kelly Macdonald gathered in New York on Friday, the 10th anniversary of the publication of “Voices of a People’s History of the United States”—a work based on the late historian Howard Zinn’s million-title selling book “A People’s History of the United States”—for a reading of “Voices.” Mortensen spoke with “Democracy Now!” about “history’s corporate takeover[s].”

“There’s a deficit of happiness, a deficit of community,” the “Trews” host told Amy Goodman in a recent “Democracy Now!” interview. “All of us or a lot of us feel a little adrift, like we don’t how we’re supposed to live.”

“There’s a deficit of happiness, a deficit of community,” the “Trews” host told Amy Goodman in a recent “Democracy Now!” interview. “All of us or a lot of us feel a little adrift, like we don’t how we’re supposed to live.”

Former Marine and State Department official Matthew Hoh, the first known U.S. official to resign in protest over the Afghan War, describes President Obama’s authorization of 1,500 additional troops to Iraq in the campaign against the Islamic State as “for lack of a better phrase ... crazy.”

Truthdig contributor and investigative journalist Greg Palast reports that, under the pretense of stopping so-called “voter fraud,” 27 states are participating in a program that is being used to prevent Democratic-leaning voters from going to the polls.

Amy Goodman interviews UC Berkeley professor John A. Powell on Tuesday about Ferguson, Mo. Powell says two of the most important issues of policing poor communities is whether there’s trust, and whether authorities recognize the humanity of those they are charged to protect.

As Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon ordered National Guard troops into Ferguson, a preliminary autopsy revealed that police shot teen Michael Brown six times. Amnesty International ordered a delegation to monitor developments, and a local pastor called for the police chief’s resignation after department leaks muddied clarity of the lead-up to the teen’s death.

Ayman Mohyeldin, NBC’s veteran reporter who was playing soccer with the four Palestinian boys killed on the beach Wednesday, was removed from Gaza despite his reporting being, in Glenn Greenwald’s words, “far more balanced and even-handed” than the rest of the American media’s coverage of the conflict. Late Friday night, after protests with the hashtag #LetAymanReport trended on Twitter, “NBC reversed course” and announced it was sending Mohyeldin back to Gaza over the weekend.

Half of the reported 101 Palestinians killed by an Israeli offensive over the last week are estimated to be women and children. No deaths have been reported in Israel. Palestinian human rights attorney Noura Erakat and Joshua Hantman, senior adviser to Israel’s ambassador to the United States, debate the question of what should be done.

This Fourth of July, “Democracy Now!” remembers Frederick Douglass’ defiant Independence Day address, read by James Earl Jones during a performance of Howard Zinn’s “Voices of a People’s History of the United States,” and the life and legacy of legendary American folk singer Pete Seeger, who died this year at the age of 94.

“The story revolves around four black kids at a mostly white Ivy League college,” director Justin Simien told Amy Goodman in an interview at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. That’s the basic premise of Simien’s much-awaited debut comedy “Dear White People,” a film that promises to do much more than just make you laugh.

This week, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected an appeal from Argentina over its $1.5 billion debt in a ruling critics say validates predatory behavior by “vulture funds.” “Democracy Now!” looks at the case that is being called the “trial of the century” in how poor countries repay sovereign debt.

As Sunni militants continue their march across the country, Secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged Monday that the U.S. is considering launching drone strikes in Iraq. “Democracy Now!” speaks with Iraqi-American political analyst Raed Jarrar for clarity on the developments.

William Worthy, a dissident American journalist who defied the U.S. government by reporting from the Soviet Union, Cuba, China, Iran, North Vietnam and Algeria during the Cold War, died this month at age 92 of Alzheimer’s disease. Award-winning journalist Jeremy Scahill and others remark on his life.

The Federal Communications Commission voted Thursday on new rules that would let Internet providers charge media companies extra fees to receive preferential treatment, such as faster speeds for their products and content. “Democracy Now!” hosts a debate on Net neutrality.

Salah Hassan was tortured by U.S. soldiers inside the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq 10 years ago. To date, no high ranking U.S. official has been held accountable for the tortures that became widely publicized, but Hassan and other former prisoners are attempting to sue CACI International, one of the private contractors that ran the prison.

How far would you go to tell the truth? “Democracy Now!” talks with James Spinoe, director of the new documentary “Silenced,” which follows three national security whistle-blowers who struggle “to reveal the darkest corners of America’s war on terror while enduring the wrath of a government increasingly determined to maintain secrecy.”

Killings of environmental and land rights activists worldwide have tripled over the past decade, bringing the death rate to an average of two per week, according to a new report by the group Global Witness.

Laura Gottesdiener talks with “Democracy Now!” about her TomDispatch article on the team-up of big banks and private equity firms to bundle rental property mortgages into a new financial product called “rental-backed securities.”

Former Wall Street executive, financial journalist and Truthdig contributor Nomi Prins tells “Democracy Now!” how a small number of bankers have played critical roles in shaping a century’s worth of financial, foreign and domestic policy in the United States, a series of events that she documents in her new book, “All the Presidents’ Bankers: The Hidden Alliances That Drive American Power.”

Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh talks with “Democracy Now!” on Monday about evidence he uncovered that suggests Turkey may have supplied sarin gas to Syrian rebels and could have been behind the deadly attack that almost led to a U.S. strike on Syria last year.

In a second program Friday, “Democracy Now!” hosts a debate on who is protesting in Venezuela and why. Margarita López Maya, a Venezuelan historian and political analyst with the Center for Development Studies at the Central University of Venezuela, engages Roberto Lovato, a writer with New American Media who recently returned from reporting in Caracas.

Someone—maybe the Russians—leaked an audio recording of a high-ranking State Department official and the American ambassador in Kiev seeming to plot a coup d’etat against the elected government of Ukraine.

Pete Seeger wasn’t one of those legendary performers who made the world a better place with music. He was the original. He was inimitable and unique and indomitable in his mission to bring light to the dark places.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist says the Obama administration “cherry-picked intelligence” on the gas attacks in the Damascan suburb of Ghouta in August “to justify a strike against [Syrian President Bashar] Assad.”

A 95 page draft of a chapter of possibly the most consequential U.S. trade deal in history released by WikiLeaks on Wednesday details plans regarding patents, copyright, trademarks and industrial design, “showing their wide-reaching implications for Internet services, civil liberties, publishing rights and medicine accessibility,” “Democracy Now!” reports.